“Nevada’s health-care exchange board voted Tuesday to cut ties with Xerox Corp., which helped build the state’s troubled insurance website, and instead use the federal government’s technology for the next insurance enrollment season.

A spokesman for the exchange, known as Nevada Health Link, said lawyers were examining provisions in the state’s $75 million, five-year contract with Xerox to allow it to terminate it early. The state has paid Xerox around $12 million for work that had been completed to its satisfaction, said C.J. Bawden, the spokesman.”

“The Silver State Health Insurance Exchange board voted unanimously Tuesday to end its relationship with Xerox, the vendor contracted in 2012 to build the exchange’s Nevada Health Link website.

In place of Xerox, the exchange will adopt the federal Healthcare.gov exchange’s eligibility and enrollment functions for the sign-up period that begins Nov. 15, though it will keep its status and funding as a state-controlled system. The exchange will also issue a request for proposals to evaluate replacement systems in coming years. A new platform could come from a state with a functional marketplace, or from a vendor with a similar, proven program.”

“During his first run for the presidency in 2008, President Obama blasted the influence of insurance lobbyists and vowed to take on the industry if elected. Yet as president, he passed a health care law that funnels more than $1 trillion in subsidies to insurers, and fines Americans who do not purchase their products. And on Friday, the Obama administration relented to pressure by the insurance industry, vowing to use additional taxpayer dollars to help bail out insurers from losses racked up as part of his health care law.”

“State officials disclosed a $300 million shortfall in state revenue collections Monday, putting the state’s stellar bond rating in jeopardy — and placing new pressure on lawmakers and Gov. Terry McAuliffe to break their budget deadlock.”

“The government may be paying incorrect subsidies to more than 1 million Americans for their health plans in the new federal insurance marketplace and has been unable so far to fix the errors, according to internal documents and three people familiar with the situation.”

“In his Monday Think Tank post previewing political and policy battles over insurance premium increases, Drew Altman wrote that “85% of those who purchase insurance in the new marketplaces will get a government subsidy in the form of a tax credit to help defray the cost of the premium. That means that most people buying in the exchanges won’t pay much even if their premium cost goes up significantly” in 2015.”

“Last summer, the federal government was greeted with raised eyebrows when it awarded a UK-based firm a contract worth $1.2 billion to process Obamacare applications. At the same time, the company was being investigated for overbilling the British government tens of millions of pounds.

Though it managed to work through a year of Obamacare’s implementation relatively unnoticed, the contractor, Serco Inc., is back in the spotlight—and raising questions over the validity of its work.”